


Of All The Plans of Gods and Man....

by Jory0994



Series: Of All The Plans of Gods And Men... [2]
Category: Final Fantasy VII, Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Accidental Baby Acquisition, Astrals - Freeform, Author Commentary, Kid Fic, Multi, Worldbuilding
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-05
Updated: 2018-10-08
Packaged: 2019-07-25 11:57:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 5,631
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16197071
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jory0994/pseuds/Jory0994
Summary: Bahamut is bad at long term planning(and feelings).Shiva goes over board(and wont answer questions)Rahma was drunk(but has no regrets).Leviathan does what Leviathan wants(and thinks Bahamut is dumb).Titan was shanghaied(but thought it was hilarious).Ifirit is having the time of his life(and is over the Solheim thing,everyone feels better after a nap)and no one knows where the Scourge went...........Carbuncle where did you get that.





	1. of omniscience and the lack there of

**Author's Note:**

  * For [CharlotteDaBookworm](https://archiveofourown.org/users/CharlotteDaBookworm/gifts), [LuxRoyalty (slytherinsdaughter)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/slytherinsdaughter/gifts), [Elri (angelrider13)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/angelrider13/gifts), [SparkleMoose](https://archiveofourown.org/users/SparkleMoose/gifts), [notavodkashot](https://archiveofourown.org/users/notavodkashot/gifts), [The_Peridot_Shade](https://archiveofourown.org/users/The_Peridot_Shade/gifts).



> So all of this is world building that may or may not end up cannon

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thanks for all the inspiration from my friend over on tumbler  
> Charlottedabookworm, angelrider13, SparkelMoose, LuxKing are also hear on Ao3 but idk how to make links.

on omniscience and the lack there of

⦁ Bahumat is bad at long term planning.  
1\. Bahumat refuses to believe this.  
⦁ Every thing was going as it should be, The Accursed is spreading chaos, things where building to the final confrontation between the Fallen King and the King of light, in fact the first of the prophasiezed had just been born: The Father.  
⦁ Bahumat decides to look ahead, to decide which human female ze should nudge The Father towards to carry the King of Light.  
⦁ No,no,no,hell no, maybe, on second thought no,no,no,no.  
⦁ "Do i have to do everything myself?", wait that might work  
⦁ Bahumat is bad at long term planning.  
⦁ Bahumat decides to carry the King of Light themself, and since kings can't just marry a random woman off the street, incarnates to a set of mortal parents.  
1\. And does not tell anyone where their going.  
2\. Who cares that a human shell will not hold a gods might for long, ze doesn't need to stay after The King of Light is born.  
⦁ Bahumat does not remember doing this until The King of Light comes screaming into the world after eighteen hours of labor.  
⦁ Aulea beams up at Regis as he places Noctis in her arms, and Bahumat looks down at zir son and bursts into tears.  
1\. Thankfully for Bahumat everyone puts this down to the eighteen hour labor.  
⦁ Bahumat is NOT panicking, zes not.  
1\. Yes ze is. ⦁ Bahumat did not expect the human shell(her body) to affect them so much. When did ze fall in love with The Father(Regis)? Why dose ze want to cry when ze thinks of the Prophecy?(no,no,no) Why doesn't ze want to leave now that the King of Light(Noctis, her baby) has been born? Why doesn't ze want the human shell(Her Body) gone(dead)? Why does ze miss her mortal parents(mom,dad)? Why does ze want a cheeseburger?  
1\. Bahumat is bad at long term planing.  
2\. Bahumat you just gave birth eat the cheeseburger.  
3\. None of the astrals know where the draconian is.  
a. Except carbuncle, more on that latter.  
⦁ Aulea decides that NO her son will not die thanks to HER fuck up

1\. She probably(definitely) owed Ardyn an apology.


	2. Snow Queen,Fair as Frost,what secrets rest behind your glitering smile?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> How many secrets hide in the home of the oracle?

Snow Queen,Fair as Frost,what secrets rest behind your glittering smile?

⦁ Queen Sylva Nox Florent has no King, one Prince, one Princess and a Smile that glitters like frost.

⦁ The Oracle never answers questions about her children's father,and every time someone asks they are greeted with a smile that should be as warm as a summer breeze but is instead as cold as a howling blizzard.

⦁ The first pregnancy was announced at her oracle accention ceremony, a scant two months after her mothers death.  
1\. Her father was long lost to the ever hungry Niflheim

⦁ Her announcement that she would take no husband and rule on her own was met with cautionate acceptance, she is the Oracle after all.

⦁ Prince Ravus was greeted with good cheer and celebration buy his mothers people. The Gossips (and the Spies) were disappointed about not being able to find the father by the child's looks.

⦁ A small black puppy of indeterminate heritage appeared in Prince Ravus' cradle that night  
1\. The Queen just smiled a secret little smile.

⦁ On a probably unrelated note the caretakers of the family manor are very frustrated about the heating not working properly.  
1\. it was very kind of the royal family to pretend not to notice.

⦁ Four years latter the Gossips(and the Spies) are thrown into a tizzy when the Queen announced her second pregnancy, Who is the father?

⦁ Princess Lunafreya is born, and Tenebre rejoices because the next oracle has been born.  
1\. When a small white puppy wiggles its way out of the astral realm into Lunafreyas cradle that night, the Queen is there frowning.  
2\. Her daughter, her beautiful, precious Moonbeam has been caught up in Bahamuts Prophecy.  
3\. What did this mean her for son, her kind, solemn Snowdrift? How would he survive the Long Night, he literally wont hurt a fly!  
a. "They are just followin there natures mamma, not hurtin anyone!" "alright Snowdrift but wash your hands after you take it out" "K".

⦁ No. If Bahamut thinks she is going to follow a plan that gets her children killed, then she will show him just why she is the only astral who is known for killing another astral.

⦁ Shiva was mortal before it was cool.


	3. What exactly was in that booze?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> im not saying that galahdens are wookies...

What exactly was in that booze?

⦁ To the vast majority of Eos, Galahd was a strange, wild place full of heathen barbarians.  
1\. This was True:  
2\. Galahd is a strange place(old ruins with vines completely covering them, helpless against times embrace) full of wild things (the plants, the animals, the people), and a wild place (is the Jungle looking at you? Calling you?) full of strange things(why dosent mama have any parents? Why does she leave on the dark moon?)  
3\. This is False:   
4\. Galahd follows one god, is respectful of two others, and has no strong opinions on the other three. Galahd also dosent care about your weird mainlander cultural expectations, and will speak to their god any way they damn well please.

⦁ To Galahd, Eos was a weirdly uptight place, full of nosy busybodies  
1\. Technically these are both true, in compare

⦁ Galahd as a whole has been sworn to Rahma since the fall of Solheim, is the only place in Eos where an astral can be called upon with out the Oracle.

⦁ Eos knows this, and still the islands are left to the natives.  
1\. and Tidespawn of course.

⦁ The Reason that Rahma is not inundated with petitions, pleas, and prayers is this: Galahd is a horrifying death trap to those it does not like, and i don't mean the natives  
1\. The Plants: Bright gorgeous color, inviting scents, a hunger for fresh meat, and the mobility to catch you.  
2\. The Animals: either venomous, murderous, both, or sheep.  
a. Do not ask how the sheep survive.  
3\. The Jungle: IS watching you, the Jungle is Calling you, will you answer?

⦁ Knowing what I've told you about Galahd, would it surprise you that one of the ways a Priestess of Rahma can get his attention is to go outside during a storm and yell:  
"GET DOWN HEAR YOU DRUNKEN TWISTER!!"   
"What has got you in such a snit, my Strike"  
"YOU GOT ME PREGNANT YOU BOOZE ADDLED FOG!!"  
"Oh Shit"


	4. Come my love be one with the Sea, rule with me for eternity

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> not sure if its mermaids....or just a Deep One

Come my love be one with sea, Rule with me for eternity...

⦁ Leviathan does what Leviathan wants.  
1\. Usually this is sleep.  
2\. Sometimes its haunting a coffee shop in Altissa, reading self help and pop psychology books in a vain attempt to understand humans.

⦁ Levi loves humans, Leviathan hates humans

⦁ Levi is the calm surface, Leviathan the riptide beneath it.  
1\. Leviathan does not do generalizations human Levi can tell you apart buy the blood that flows in your veins.

⦁ Levi loves zer human foundlings, always so scared when they come to her, and shows them all the splendors of the depths, offers them safety from there fears, just until they find their feet (courage) again.  
1\. Some never do, but that's ok some times courage is starting over.  
2\. Be Polite if you meet a Tidespawn, they hold the Tidemothers favor.

⦁ Leviathan hates the humans that send Zir Drowned to Zir, always thinking that the Deep will hide there crimes, tears them apart even as they try to plead for mercy (the Sea knows no Mercy but that found in Etros' embrace).

⦁ There is a Reason that no one remembers Atlantis. It was destroyed as thoroughly as Solheim, Yet Leviathan did not fall as Ifirit did.  
1\. This is because Leviathan confronted Ramuh the Judge of the Gods and dared him to judge zer actions.  
2\. It should tell you something about Atlantis, that Leviathan was Just.

⦁ To help Zer Drowned survive the Deep Ze crafts them tails in place of legs, covers their bodies in scales, webs their fingers, and gives them eyes suited to the Deep. Then she teaches them how to shift back and forth.  
1\. The new Tidespawn are all assured that they are always welcome in the Deep, but they are still human, and they need land if they want their own spawn, the Gift will not pass on but for the barest physical traces.   
2\. Galahd is the only place that the Tidespawn will show both forms to a friend or lover, even Acorrdo asks to many questions.  
a. Unless its to eat them of course, is anyone missing the town asshole from your waterside city?

⦁ Leviathan was very annoyed when she was woken buy the currents of time shifting, What did Ramuh think he was...huh niblings. Bahumat isn't going to take that well....

⦁ Where the fuck was bahumat? Whatever not my problem.

⦁ Really Shiva TWO? They aren't even twins like Ramuhs'.

⦁ Sense I'm awake anyway might as well check all the currents....oh so that's where Bahumat went, why is everyone spawning did I miss Astral spawning season?

⦁ .......I want one......But eww humans.

⦁ OH Hey these are even in eggs! There are a lot of theme they wont miss one, and they are at just the right development stage to add Zir Ichor.

⦁ Wait why is this the only one with a soul? Why are they identical, do humans do that? Aha notes......Oh...come along My little Starfish you should hatch in a warmer place than this, Which of my Tidespawn has living land family...

⦁ Niflheim never finds out who or what destroyed that Facility setting back production of MTs by years and killing Versteel Besithia.  
1\. They also never notice that one of the cloning tanks was missing, and got there too late to notice the saltwater before it evaporated. 

⦁ Levi wants to know why these child care books are contradicting each other, and if ze can get a refund.


	5. Mary, Mary, quite contrary, How does your garden grow? With silver bells, and cockle shells,And pretty maids all in a row.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> But what about my BEES?

Mary, Mary, quite contrary, How does your garden grow? With silver bells, and cockle shells,And pretty maids all in a row.

⦁ Everyone knows the story of how Titan caught the meteor that would have destroyed all of Eos, and fell into an eternal sleep after expending all his strength.

⦁ What everyone knows is a lie.  
1\. "Look People I've got shit to do that doesn't involve fixing problems you can fix your self."  
2\. "I am the Foundation upon which every thing rests, Including Etros Gate I'm busy."  
3\. "I am the Plants that Bloom, do you have any idea how delicate the ecosystem is?'  
4\. We can't all have death islands to hide behind like Ramuh!

⦁ No one is actually sure that Titan has a priesthood any more, no one can remember seeing one or hearing about them.  
1\. Despite this every one knows to be respectful of the animals you hunt and plants you gather, to Be Polite to a stranger you share a Haven with, to use the correct recycling bin.  
2\. And they know what happens when you aren't respectful, polite, and environmentally conscious.  
3\. Niflheim has a terrible problem with missing persons.

⦁ Titan does in fact have a priesthood! Its just informal.

⦁ Have you ever helped with a river clean up? Planted a tree? Had a garden? Had Bees? Helped a trapped animal? Got caught up in haunting music that made you dance madly all night with wild abandon surrounded by feverdreams and daemons?

⦁ Congratulations you are now a Priest or Priestess of Titan. Go about your business. Don't worry the tattoos will only show during the full moon. Don't think about it.

⦁ Titan had no say in becoming friends with Leviathan and Ramuh instead of distant colleges, and yet.  
⦁ "Hey Ti if you don't get the point of gender why are both your forms so human pleasing"  
1\. "Levi?! What I know what a gender is for, I just don't see the point in picking one, and the humans react better to a pretty form, like bees and flow......why do you have a baby?"  
"It's mine look isn't my little Starfish do cute?"  
"It is adorable, look at the toesies, but I didn't think your Tidespawn had shark teeth on land? or nematocysts?"  
"No I told you it's mine, this is Prompto Leviathanspawn, see I put my name on it and everything. Anyway Bahamut is trying to make plans again, you remember what happened last time."  
"Oh hell no I wasn't happy about the Long Night fuckery to begin with, do you know what that will do to my PLANMMPHF!!!  
"You are going to wake it up, now hush. Lets go pick you out a baby pollinator and then wake Ifirit up."  
"But he's a dick, and I assume you have opinions on which human to pick?"  
"Nah that was angry Ifirit, he's a new flame every time he dies remember? As to your options....wanna fuck with Bahamuts head?"  
"Oh yeah, we probably should have woken him up sooner, and do you even have to ask?"  
"Probably, and yes I had to ask, you need to do the flower baby thing, but for you and the Kings Shield instead of two humans."  
"I need an invitation for that."  
"His son is asking for a sibling, but the parents married for duty and friendship not love or even sexual compatibility, will that work?"  
"Good enough, they name themselves after flowers right? Which should I use...."  
⦁ The Citadel was thrown into a panic when on Gladiolus Amicitias' eighth birthday when an Iris burst out of the potted plants on the balcony of the Amicitia family suit, and quickly grew to the size of a microwave.  
1\. A leaf curled out strangely with the dark veins spelling out: The Archeon grants your wish young Shield, take care of your new sibling.  
2\. The Queen facepalmed when no one was looking.  
3\. Gladio is now technically the unknowing High Priest of Titan

⦁ The flower bloomed six sunrises and six sunsets later, and Iris Amicitia was welcomed to the family.

⦁ Titans' moral alignment is Chaotic Petty


	6. From what I've tasted of desire, I hold with those who favor fire

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ifirit: Frazzled College Student

From what I've tasted of desire, I hold with those who favor fire

⦁ Fire is the only element that can die. Ifirit IS fire

⦁ Ifirit changes personalities every time he wakes up from dying.

⦁ During the reign of Solheim Ifirit was a slow and steady hearth fire, warming and welcoming all into his temples regardless of their station in life.  
1\. Until human human greed led to the Sacking of Heliopolis and the death of his mortal Messenger Phoenix.  
2\. Everyone knows what happened to Solheim.  
3\. No one speaks of Heliopolis

⦁ Ifirit was cast down by his lover Shiva after being Judged by Ramuh to have been in the wrong.  
1\. Phoenix Izunia was not killed buy rioters but by draining her self dry healing those injured during the panic.  
2\. No one knows why Shiva volunteered, she doesn't answer questions.  
3\. It only takes a spark to start a wildfire.

⦁ While dead Ifirit resides in Etros' Garden, where he spends time helping Etro with her duties to the dead, making sure souls heal from their trials in life, ushering those ready for it on to the cycle to be born again in a different world, fighting off non-Euclidean beings from beyond Space and Time.  
1\. This is the Astral equivalent of going home for the weekend from collage and your parent putting you to work around the house. 

⦁ Ifirit wakes up a Bonfire, with a good sized lake hovering over his face.  
"WHAT THE BLEEDING FUCK LEVIATHAN!!!"  
"Are you sane now?"  
"Was he ever?"  
"Fuck you pebbles."  
"Both of you shut up! Frit are you sane enough for hi-jinks and shenanigans?"  
"That depends are you gonna put the water down anytime soon? I can't die again yet I've got shit to do, since you assholes waited TWO THOUSAND YEARS TO WAKE ME UP!"  
"You shouldn't have torched my favorite sushi joint then. Now give me your oath that you will never raise a hand to my current spawn unless ze plans to do something on the scale of opening the Outer Gates."  
"And mine"  
"You both spawned?"  
"We all did, even Bam."  
"Oh what the Hell. I Ifirit the Infernian, Hearth Ever Burning, Beacon in the Night, Pyerburner, hear by swear that I will cause no harm to the Astral-Born until such time that they become a danger to Our Star. I Swear this By the Dawn and the Dusk."  
*Splash* "Kind of open ended isn't it?"  
"Whatever, you mentioned hi-jinks and shenanigans, Fishy?"  
"Bahamut finally incarnated like they where meant to, and now she is trying to stop one of her own plans. Originally I was going to wake you up just to mess with them, but Bam is even worse at planing than we thought so we might need all the Astral-Born we can get if she breaks something important, like the lifestream."  
"So do you want a baby?"  
"Yes, where do I get one"  
"Do you want to do the sex thing?"  
"Hmm yes,yes I do, a male."  
"Ramuhs' male spawn has a sworn brother who's your type."  
"Lead on."

⦁ Libertus Ostium never knew what hit him.  
1\. He also broke into Nyxs' apartment in a panic when he found a baby girl, in a crib made out of pumice, in his living room nine months later.  
2\. The crib also held a letter: Thanks for the great night I'll be around to visit--Ifirit  
3\. Ifirit had also left a bag of baby essentials, all in shades of red, orange, yellow, and white.

⦁ "FUCK! I have to rebuild my priesthood from scratch. 1\. Wait Bahamut learned compassion?


	7. Wings of light and dark spread afar, heaven's dark harbinger

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> How does immigration work again?

Wings of light and dark spread afar, heaven's dark harbinger

⦁ The Starscourge has plagued Eos for over two thousand years, infecting all and sundry, turning them quickly and excruciatingly, into terrible daemons who want nothing more than to turn everyone else into one of them.

⦁ But what is it?

⦁ Some people think its a curse, some think its a disease, others think its a test from the Six.  
1\. In reality it's an alien refugee.

⦁ Nether Eos or Etro thought they would need to quarantine it, who ever herd of a divinely spreadable disease?  
1\. Several Astrals got additional duties when They learned of the Things Between.  
2\. They did NOT tell the mortals.  
3\. That was probably a mistake

⦁ Shortly after its arrival it collapsed into a cloud of miasma and vanished from all sight.  
1\. Titan used its arrival on the meteor to fake eternal slumber, and promptly fucked off to be a hermit.  
2\. Ifirit was already dead and got a crash course in fighting eldritch abominations in Etros' Garden.  
a. No trial by fire jokes please and thank you.  
b. Fighting Leviathan was great practice.

⦁ But what IS it you ask?

⦁ The conciseness of two higher beings thrown violently from their world in an effort to distract a world eater from it.   
1\. Did it work? Who knows.  
2\. Their was only meant to be one mind, not two.

⦁ Minerva, mother goddess of the cetra, a race of humans who could manipulate the blood of the Planet Gaia, called the lifestream.  
1\. Unfortunately Jenova, a parasitic alien goddess from yet another planet, is very good at surviving.  
2\. Fortunately Eos, unlike Gaia, had a guardian for her lifeSTREAM.  
3\. There are no daemons in the water.

⦁ Minerva and Jenova spent several years fighting each other in the astral realm, ignoring what their bodily remains inflicted upon the World.

⦁ Right up until Ardyn was rejected by the Crystal, sending enough of a shock through them to knock them into a coma.  
1\. Before they fell unconscious Minerva, pained, cast out looking for something familiar/safe.  
2\. And found Ardyn, who looked so much like her Beloved Genesis, betrayed and heartbroken, like when she Chose Her Priest.  
3\. The remains of Jenova latched on to the superficial resemblance to one who bore her cells, thinking to survive.  
4\. Ardyn did not know this, and unknowingly held the souls of two goddesses undergoing a merge, safe in his own soul.

⦁ They wake to a surge of confusion washing over them.  
1\. "--Mother wants to tell the emperor about him and if that happens, I'm going to have to burn down the empire, and if that happens the other Astrals will come after me, and then I'd have to fight them, but for that to happen I would need someone to babysit, and if I need a babysitter, it would have to be you because anyone else wouldn't fight them, and you would if only out of spite, also I don't know how to change a diaper and it stinks."   
2\. ".....If i fake it's death and show you how to change a diaper will you leave?"  
"Yes. Please."

⦁ The goddess watched from behind the eyes of her unknowing Avatar as he showed the strange white haired man how to change a diaper, who was he to speak so casually of burning down empires and fighting gods?

⦁ She was surprised when he vanished in a burst of glitter that faded before it hit the ground.

⦁ Her surprise was enough to make Ardyn jerk and look around.

⦁ "Peace my own"  
"Who said that?"  
"Don't speak out loud my own, and I believe I am called the Star scourge"  
"Prove it"

⦁ Ardyn gasped awake, wondering when he fell unconscious, and stopped half way to standing to stare at the woman before him, She looked soft standing in a pink dress long brown hair in an equal pink Ribbon.  
1\. If not for the overwhelming feeling of sheer power.  
2\. And the giant albino snake she had draped across her shoulders.  
"And who might you be, my dear"  
"You did tell me to prove it my own." Ardyn took an involuntary step back and quickly glanced around, but they where in an endless field full of unrecognizable white flowers.  
"Why are you calling me that? And where are we?"  
"In reverse order we are in my personal corner of the astral realm, while your body recuperates from my removing the Scourge from it, don't worry you won't be found unconscious, and the first question requires a bit of back story. Will you Listen?"  
"What?" he squeaked, and then pretended he hadn't.  
"I am removing the Scourge from you slowly enough that you will survive it, you are on leave from your job as chancellor because they think you have a cold, you sent a very nice assassin after that women you needed to hush up, honestly trying to sell her own son to the government to experiment on humph. Now will you listen to my Tale?"  
"...Sure"  
"... and that is how I accidentally made you my Avatar."  
"I'm too exhausted to be angry." he said flatly. "Why speak up now?"  
"It is only now that I woke up, if I hadn't felt something shifting in the astral realm I probably never would have woken at all."  
"What did you feel?"  
"I don't know but if I had to guess other children like your glittery friends son being born."  
"Carbuncle isn't my friend....now what?"  
"Now I make it up to you my own, will you hear my offer? Even if you reject it you will leave here mortal once again."  
Ardyn froze in painful, treacherous hope, but wretched him self under control.   
"What offer?"  
"One you know, to just walk away. The other two are a bit different. Now that I am healed I will take my place among the pantheon here, to do so I will need a Priesthood to establish a domain for my self, thankfully there isn't much overlap. You could be my High Priest and raise my child."  
"Why a child?"  
"Because I miss being called Mother. Now the last option is....also a type of death I suppose, I could turn you back into a baby with no memories and no chance to regain them. You would be my child with you as the other parent, in an entirely new body."  
"I..I don't"  
"No take time to think after you wake up, let me prove that much to you. When you have made your decision call for Minova."

⦁ Ardyn gasped awake, staring wildly around his room in the Imperial palace, calming down as he decided it must have been a dream.  
1\. Until he saw the white flower on the nightstand  
2\. He will never tell anyone how harshly he sobbed, when after digging his nails into his arm hard enough to bleed, the blood came out red and kept flowing, with no near instant healing.  
3\. Or just how close he came to a heart attack after coming back to work, and finding all the reports of daemons disappearing and the scourge samples going missing with empty containers in their place.

⦁ Three weeks later he announces his daughter Aeriths birth to the Emperor, and starts plotting a coup.  
1\. The Emperor almost had an aneurysm.  
2\. Minova decided that a the empire as it was is to much like Shinra, but it would be a shame to waste all the hard work Her Priest had already done.  
3\. Ardyn would have done it any way, only the BEST for his baby girl.

⦁ How exactly does one go about introducing oneself to the people you had been eating, in your sleep, a few weeks ago?


	8. Come Little children I'll take thee away, to a magical land......

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> car·bun·cle  
> noun:  
> 1\. a severe abscess or multiple boil in the skin, typically infected with staphylococcus bacteria   
> synonyms: boil, sore, abscess, pustule  
>  "treat the carbuncle with hot compresses"  
> 2\. a bright red gem, in particular a garnet cut en cabochon.  
> 3\. Guardian of Children and Keeper of the Lost.

Come Little children I'll take thee away, to a magical land......

⦁ Carbuncle wonders sometimes if the Astrals remember that he was around BEFORE Eos and Etro shaped them.  
1\. He was there when his Mistress birthed the Twins, using the last of her strength to give him the last command she would ever give him:   
"My Children, Guard them my friend, Promise me."  
"I will Mistress I Swear, may the Stars desert me should I fail."  
"thank...you"  
2\. He still misses Her.

⦁ Carbuncle does not like to think about his days after the Twins created the Astrals, but before they asked him to guard the new squishy things that they had made.  
1\. Carbuncle missed the entire War of Gods.  
2\. Also subsuming grief in favor of duty only works until the job is done.  
3\. Asking for his help was a desperate attempt by the Twins to pull him out of his mourning before he withered away, they had had plans for a new Astral. 

⦁ Carbuncle loves humans despite there briefness, or maybe because of it.

⦁ The first time he met a baby human, the one year old daughter of Ifirits current High Priest, he was in his fox form.

⦁ When he stood on the table to peer over the side of the bassinet, the baby grabbed his ear and let out a peel of laughter.  
1\. He fell in love instantly.

⦁ Her name was Loki and she grew up to be his First Priestess, and rammed several laws through the recently united Solheims' court which would eventually become the foundation of the Deceleration of Sentient Rights.  
1\. It became sentient rights when it as asked who would tell the Astrals they weren't sentient.

⦁ She taught him just as much as he taught her.  
1\. The most important lesson was how to start again.  
2\. He still misses her too

⦁ Carbuncle could have stopped the Fall, he just didn't think he should.  
1\. Ifirit did not destroy Lokis' Solheim.  
2\. Lokis' Solheim died when they executed a ten year old for her mothers tax debt.  
3\. No one under the age of ten died in the Fall, but total amnesia with no hope of recovery is a type of death anyway.

⦁ Carbuncle became the guardian of the Lost as well as Children, when he found he still had the memories he had taken from the children he rescued.  
1\. He could not bare to destroy them so he used them to weave a world between this one and the Beyond, creating the Dreaming where he watches over the children of Eos.

⦁ This is where everything permanently missing goes.   
1\. All your socks the washing machine ate? Sock mountain, home of the Underclothes Gnome Union.  
2\. Paperclips and hairpins? The interstate skyrail in Pixie-land is coming along nicely.  
3\. Repressed memories of the time a shadow with to many eyes ate the sister no one but you remembers? Your sister has almost earned her third tail, she earned the first by killing the shadow before it got You.  
4\. Carbuncle thinks she will make squad captain before the decade is out, be proud.

⦁ People that die lost or forgotten often spend time there before they pass on, coming to terms with what happened.  
1\. Children often stay the longest.

⦁ Sometimes coming to terms with your death means helping save the living from things worse than death or daemons.  
1\. There are a lot of stories the hunter communities could pass on about foxes with multiple tails distracting monsters and daemons from a fatal blow,or leading them to hidden havens that vanish at sunrise, but they won't.  
2\. Humans were Not told about the things that creep into the World through the cracks in reality and so pin it all on daemons.  
3\. They are wrong.

⦁ Carbuncle was busy when something bloomed into being in the Dreaming and it took a bit to get to it.  
1\. So imagine his surprise when he found a giant sword representing all of Bahamuts' memories stabbed into the top of Crystal Candy Mountain.  
2\. Apparently Bahamut ether forgot or didn't know that when an Astral incarnates as a human for the first time they always lose their memories, until something triggers thier return.  
3\. Watching the strands of Auleas' baby dreams, and considering what Shiva is up to, he felt the potential for the world to shift, it would only take a couple nudges, and Bam makes terrible plans anyway.  
4\. Turning to stare at Mojito Falls a mischievous grin spread across his face.  
5\. Levi, Ti, and Frit jumping on the baby bandwagon was a hilarious side effect of poking the time stream to see when he should have a baby.

⦁ Carbuncle has had sequential human forms since he first followed Loki into university. The Inari family was a small one, but could trace their ancestry back hundreds of years if asked (no one ever does).   
1\. He made a terrible polisci student.  
2\. But he does try to update his child psychology degree once a decade, hopping countries every time he pretends to be his own son or daughter.  
3\. He is currently Caramel Inari (the 84th) a social worker in Graela, Niflheim.  
4\. And a cell leader in the Niflheim Civil Resistance.

⦁ Sometimes he thinks, as he stares at Isabella Tummelt, babymama and longtime friend with benefits, you think you know a person.  
"What do you mean you are giving him to a government program?"  
"Why not its a good program, he'll go far in the military."  
"No give him to me I'll raise him myself and you never need to see either of us again."  
"Don't be like that Mel, just because I'm ready for motherhood now doesn't mean we can't try again in a few years."  
Carbuncle stopped listening and tossed sleep powder in her face, watching coldly as she slumped back against the hospital bed.  
"Why even agree to have the baby then bitch?"

⦁ Carbuncle had been preparing for his sons birth and quickly grabbed the dipper bag, and all the stuffed toys his friends and coworkers had dropped off over the past two days, checked for cameras and vanished in a puff of glitter that vanished before it hit the floor, towards the nearest source of divine power.  
1\. Unfortunately this was Ardyn Izunia Chancellor of Niflheim, Ardyn Lucis Caelum The Accursed.

⦁ Luckily Carbuncle didn't appear close enough to be hit and was enough of a motormouth to put Ardyn on his back foot long enough for him to start listening.

"Favored of the...Oh hey Ardyn any way I need your help. I have a son I need to protect from the government your messing with for whatever reason, they don't know about me being Carbuncle but they are probably aware of the resistance leader thing. The mother wants to tell the emperor about him and if that happens I'm going to have to burn down the empire, and if that happens the other Astrals will come after me, and then I'd have to fight them, but for that to happen I would need someone to babysit, and if I need a babysitter, it would have to be you because anyone else wouldn't fight them, and you would if only out of spite, also I don't know how to change a diaper and it stinks."  
"...If i fake its death and teach you to change a diaper will you leave?"  
"Yes. Please."

⦁ After a quick lesson and explanation on who to hush up, he puffed into his apartment, grabbed all the baby and sentimental things he could in less than an hour, and left a letter in a dead drop telling his resistance cell that they had been compromised and to go to ground.   
1\. And that Isabella Tummelt was a traitor.  
2\. Carbuncle doesn't take betrayal well.

⦁ Staring at his son, snug in a Tenebrean hotel, tears falling now that his baby boy was safe:  
"You know little man I think is should call you Loqi, think you can help me like your namesake did? Don't let me pull an Ifirit."


End file.
